Real final sales and inventories as portents of recession – by New Deal democrat As I have mentioned previously from time to time, I read people who have interesting things to say even if their worldview is very different from mine. One such person is Mike Shedlock, a/k/a Mish. He’s an aggressive libertarian and has […]
Jobless claims: the situation remains, ‘all system go’ – by New Deal democrat Initial jobless claims declined -2,000 last week to 190,000, while the 4 week moving average increased 1,750 to 193,000. Continuing claims, with a one week delay, increased 5,000 to 1,655,000. All of these remain excellent numbers: To repeat my meme over the […]
February manufacturing and January construction continue negative, while auto sales improve – by New Deal democrat We started out yet another month of data with bad news in two leading sectors. The ISM manufacturing index has been showing contraction since November, and its more leading new orders subindex since September. And did so again in February, […]
Housing prices continue to come down – like a feather – by New Deal democrat As I’ve repeated many times in the past 10 years, in housing prices follow sales with a lag. Housing permits and starts both peaked early in 2022, and house prices followed during the summer. This morning the FHFA and Case Shiller […]
Durable goods orders: more deceleration, still no recession – by New Deal democrat I normally don’t pay too much attention to durable goods orders. That’s because they are very noisy. They don’t always turn down in advance of a recession (see 2007-08), although they may at least stall, and there are a number of false […]
Weekly Indicators for February 20 – 24 at Seeking Alpha – by New Deal democrat My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. While several of the important coincident indicators continue to hover just above neutrality, importantly neither long term Treasury yields nor corporate bond yields nor mortgage rates have made a new high in the […]
New home sales: a bright spot in the housing indicators – by New Deal democrat New home sales are very noisy, and are heavily revised, which is why I pay more attention to single family housing permits. But they do have one important value: they are frequently the first housing indicator to turn at both […]
Strong upward revisions push real personal income to new highs, put 2 important coincident indicators firmly in expansion territory – by New Deal democrat Almost all of the news in this morning’s release for personal income and spending for January was positive. Nominally, personal income rose +0.6% and personal spending rose 1.8%. The deflator also […]
The “gold standard” of jobs data shows a strong rebound in Q3 2022 – by New Deal democrat The preliminary estimate for the Q3 2022 QCEW was released yesterday. Although the monthly nonfarm payrolls report gets all the glory, it is only a survey. The QCEW is an actual census of the roughly 95% of […]
Initial claims continue recent excellent streak – by New Deal democrat Initial jobless claims continued their recent excellent reports, as there were only 192,000 new claims, down -3,000 from the week before, and close to their 50+ year lows of last March and April. The 4 week average increased 1,500 to 191,250, still an excellent […]